


revive

by epsiloneridani



Category: Halo (Video Games) & Related Fandoms
Genre: Found Family, Gen, Noble survives AU, implied PTSD
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-09-24
Updated: 2018-09-24
Packaged: 2019-07-16 12:43:09
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,702
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16086350
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/epsiloneridani/pseuds/epsiloneridani
Summary: Noble’s back, Noble’s alive, but not completely together. Not completely whole. Time changes everything – maybe their sniper most of all.Jorge hates the silence.





	revive

**Author's Note:**

> Warnings: implied PTSD

“Still don’t know why we can’t just wear armor.”

Emile’s tugging at the collar of his dress uniform for the fifteenth time in as many minutes. Jorge glances at him out of the corner of his eye and nudges him with an elbow.

“How long’s this thing gonna  _take?_ ” Emile growls.

“As long as it takes,” Kat hisses, their CO in lieu of Carter for the duration. “Now shut  _up_.”

The ceremony is large and loud and full of Spartans and soldiers and civilians alike. Their Commander’s trapped at the front for the moment, standing strong and tall beside the others chosen to be at the head. To everyone else, he must look at ease.

To Noble he looks like he’s in hell.

Jun’s three people to Carter’s right, stalwart at Musa’s side. Jorge cracks a tiny smile. So solemn. So serious. That’s not like him.

Didn’t  _used_  to be like him.

Jorge loses sight of him by the time the speeches are over and they’ve marshalled their strength to march back to the barracks. Emile’s bunking with Six, Kat with Carter.

That leaves Jorge with his own room.

He should be grateful for the quiet after all of today’s noise but it’s too unnatural to put him at ease so he lays on the bottom bunk and stares into space and tries not to think about how strange the empty silence is.

—-

“Haven’t seen you since Reach.”

It takes Jorge a moment to realize Kurt means their  _training_  on Reach, not the hell he lived just six months ago.

Not the hell that tore Noble apart.

“Right,” Jorge says quietly and Kurt slides onto the mess bench across from him and folds his hands on the table. Always so patient. Always so kind.

Jorge lifts his shoulders in a shrug, fiddles with the empty mug that’s been sitting between his hands for the better part of a half an hour. “How have you been?” he asks, and it feels so hollow, so wrong.

Kurt shrugs. “I’m surviving.”

“I heard. Nukes?”

“A slipspace bomb?”

Jorge snorts softly. “Fair.”

Kurt’s smile has always been contagious but it’s so sad, now – so burdened. “We’ve been through a hell of a lot, huh?”

Kurt so much more than most. “Yes,” Jorge says. The words ache. So many of them are dead. So many of then are gone. “Noble tells me you trained the Threes.”

Kurt’s smile collapses. “I did,” he forces and Jorge knows he must be thinking of the rest of the companies, the other six hundred in Alpha and Beta. “They’re some of the best. Carter and Kat make a hell of a team.”

They’re all adults now but Kurt talks like they’re still kids. Something spasms in Jorge’s chest. “They’re brilliant,” he says.

Kurt coughs. “Kat’s a little  _too_  brilliant,” he says and though he tries to be deadpan a hint of humor creeps in. Jorge nods agreeably. A little too curious – but not about her own resurrection. They don’t know what alien tech ONI used to bring her back to life and none of them, not even Kat, has asked.

“You don’t wanna know,” Kurt says like he’s read his mind. There’s exhaustion and death in his eyes. “They got it from the Covenant who got it from Forerunners who built it for who the hell knows what. I’ve seen what it does when it doesn’t work, Jorge.”

“I’m sorry.”

“Don’t be. It’s not your fault.”

Silence  _burns_.

“They speak very highly of you,” Jorgeblurts _._

Kurt smiles tiredly. “I’m glad you’re back,” he says. “It’ll be good for Jun.”

Jun. Solemn, stoic Jun. “How has he been?”

Kurt grimaces. “He’s always been hard to get a read on. You know him better. You tell me. How does he look to you?”

Broken. Alone. But he can’t say that. “Controlled,” Jorge says instead, wishing that’s all it was, wishing they’d been here alongside him for the past six months. “He looks…controlled.”

“You’ve never been a very good liar, Jorge.”

Jorge shrugs. Kurt scrubs at his eyes, folds his hands and leans forward onto the table. “Musa pulled him,” he says. “After Reach. ONI wanted to redeploy him and Musa fought them down.”

Musa, still every bit as fierce as he was all those years ago. “Does Noble fall under his jurisdiction now?” he asks.

It’s hopeful enough to get him a rueful grin. “Maybe. You never know with ONI, though.”

“But if we were…” Jorge stops himself. Too much.

Too much to want everyone together again.

“Yeah,” Kurt says a long moment later. “Yeah, I think he’d approve Jun’s transfer.”

The smile feels forced. Jorge nods and falls silent. The hope drains away.

He’s so damn tired.

—-

For all the Spartans surrounding him, he still feels out of place.

Musa’s facility is impressive, well-stocked and well-staffed. The Fours carry themselves with confidence and pride and wide beaming smiles and Jorge steps aside and lets them walk by and tries to remember a time when Noble had that.

Tries to remember the last time he saw any of them  _really_  smile.

Jun’s office is all the way at the top of the building, set in a corner that overlooks the entire city. Vantage. Sniper. Jorge snorts softly and raps his knuckles on the open door.

“You can come in,” Jun calls out distractedly, without looking up. Jorge dares a step into the room. Jun doesn’t move.

Maybe this was a bad idea.

“Did you need something?” Jun’s scribbling something furiously and Jorge has a second to wonder at this new reality before Jun snaps his head up to give him an exasperated stare.

It’s washed away almost instantly – but not by a smile. Solemn. Cold. So unlike him. Jorge’s chest aches.

“Jorge,” Jun says calmly. Awkwardly. They used to talk about everything. “I…welcome back.”

The silence burns. Jorge’s heart is in his throat. He wants to grab him, shake him until the damned shell cracks and he has his brother back and Noble’s whole again, wants to drag him into a hug and say  _I’m sorry we left you behind_ , say  _I’m sorry you were alone for all that time._

But he can’t speak. He can barely even breathe.

“Jorge?”

Jun’s voice is softer, more careful, more like him, but he’s still so far away. Jorge ducks his chin, tries to suck air into tattered lungs.

The silence  _burns_.

“Jorge.” There’s a hand on his shoulder, steadying him. “Do you need to sit down or–”

Jorge shakes his head and stands motionless for another second. There’s something like worry in Jun’s eyes when he meets them – there for a brief breath and then brushed away.

Solemn. Stoic. Silent.

It’s so wrong it hurts.

Jun shifts a step away, close enough for conversation but far enough for personal space – like he would be around a  _stranger_. “Are you all right?” he asks again, halting. “Should I call the Commander–”

“I’m all right,” Jorge says and though he tries his voice still cracks, cracks, caves. He scrubs at his face absently and forces a weary grin. “Didn’t mean to drop in on you.”

“It’s all right.” Jun shuffles his weight from one foot to the other, rocks, restless. Jorge’s chest tightens.

With Jun, restless has never been good.

“I’ll just–”

“Of course,” Jun says abruptly. The smile’s fleeting, a flicker. Polite. Obligatory. Owed. “I can–”

“No,” Jorge says. His grin falters and he drives it back up. “No. It’s all right. I can see myself back down.”

Jun starts to say something, starts to argue, but – stops. “All right,” he says. Brusque. Professional. No warmth. No grin.

Not his best friend, not anymore.

Jorge glances back. Once. Only once. Jun’s at his desk, absorbed in his work. Like Jorge was never there. Like the others aren’t back at the barracks.

Like they’re still gone.

The silence burns.

—-

“We can’t expect him to be the same,” Carter says. He’s flopped on his bunk with his arms folded behind his head, staring at the ceiling. Thinking. Or worried.

Jorge glances up from the pile of papers spread across Kat’s cot. Maybe he shouldn’t have agreed to sort her files for her, considering she never does her paperwork in the first place. “Who are you trying to convince?” he asks.

“What?”

“Who are you trying to convince?” Jorge repeats patiently.

Carter swings to sit up, dragging his hands through his hair. “I don’t know,” he says, voice muffled, head down. He rubs at his eyes like he hasn’t slept well in a week.

Like he hasn’t slept well since Reach.

“He’ll come back,” Jorge says.

Carter nods mutely and doesn’t lift his head.

“He’ll come back,” Jorge repeats hoarsely. “Carter, he’ll come back.”

It feels hollower than it should.

—-

“I miss him.”

Jorge raises an eyebrow over his mug. The sun’s just barely risen, a beacon on the horizon that floods through the mess’s windows and bathes the tables in gold. It makes Emile look more angelic than he’s ever acted in his life and for some reason it strikes Jorge as hilarious.

Emile slaps his hands on the table and would have shot to stand had Jorge not caught his forearm. “Not that,” he manages. “I would never–”

Emile sinks back down with a suspicious glare. “What’s goin’ on with you lately?” he asks, and though he pitches it as gruffly as he can manage some concern still bleeds through.

“Nothing.”

“Bullshit.”

“I miss him too.”

Emile grimaces and slouches back in his seat. “It’s too quiet without him,” he almost whispers. “Ya know?”

Too well.

—-

“It’s wrong.”

Jorge waits a long moment. “What do you mean?”

Kat’s always fiddling with something. Always restless. Always moving. Driven but so impatient. It’s part of why she and Carter make such a formidable team: his reserve balances her riptide.

But she’s still now, staring at her hands. "I don’t know,” she says quietly. “It just…it's  _wrong_.”

“Not having him here,” Jorge supplies gently.

She nods without looking up. “Carter went to talk to him,” she says hoarsely, clenching her fists. Jorge clasps a careful hand over them and she stops, steadies. “To figure out if he needs to request personnel files.”

For a replacement. Another Spartan. Another sniper.

No more Jun.

Wrong.

Jorge’s chest aches. “What did he say?”

“That he doesn’t know.” Kat huffs a laugh. “That it’s up to Musa.”

“He’ll come back,” Jorge says, and it echoes in the empty mess, a promise he has no power to keep. “Kat–”

She shrugs it off and pulls away. “You don’t have to lie, Jorge,” Kat says, setting her jaw. “We both know–”

“No, we don’t,” he interrupts, and it feels more desperate than it should. “Kat–”

“Six months is a long time – and Reach was hell. He’s not the same.”

“I know. I–”

“Noble can’t be what it was,” Kat says and though her tone is steady her eyes  _bleed_. “Let him go, Jorge.”

The silence screams.

Jorge watches her leave.

—-

“You wanna help me with this?”

Jorge hesitates in the armory’s door and then steps hesitantly inside. “Sorry,” he offers quietly. Standing there too long. Too still.

It’s so damn silent.

Six shrugs and tilts her head toward the table. All of her weapons are spread across it, disassembled to be cleaned and recombined. “Like I said,” she offers easily, “you wanna help me with this?”

Jorge shrugs and steps in to stand beside her. Liz is meticulous when it comes to caring for her gear; there’s not much to clean in the first place.

It makes the silence all the more unbearable.

“It’s quiet around here without him.”

Jorge  _hmms_  his agreement. The scope is solid in his hands, cool metal and oil. Liz’s hand lands on his shoulder and he tries to force a grin, tries to reassure.

“Don’t do that,” she says, making a face that makes him chuckle. It slips away a second later. “You don’t have to pretend you’re okay.”

“I  _am_.”

“Pretending?” Liz tilts her head. “Or okay?”

Jorge rolls his eyes. Liz is motionless beside him for a long beat. “Maybe,” she offers at last, “he hasn’t come back because he doesn’t know how.”

Jorge chuffs a heave that’s not really a laugh. “I don’t follow.”

Liz shrugs and slides her gaze back to the magnum in her hands, fiddles with the trigger. “After Reach, he had to keep living. Adapt. Maybe he doesn’t know how to come back from that.”

Solemn. Stoic. Alone. Jorge’s chest tightens. Being in Covenant capture for three of the last six months was easier than this. “How do I help him?”

Liz grimaces, sets the magnum aside and clasps his shoulder. Stalwart. Unyielding.

“The same way you helped me,” she says. “Just be there.”

—-

“Am I interrupting?”

Jun glances up from his ever-present stack of papers. There’s exhaustion and aching grief in his eyes for a beat, two, and then he shoves it down, shoves it away. “No,” he says, and Jorge wonders if he’s straining, hoping, or if there’s really a note of relief to his words. “Come in.”

The chair’s built for a Spartan but Jorge still feels like he dwarfs it. Jun shoves a stack so his desk looks slightly neater and sends another three mountains toppling to the floor. He curses under his breath, something Czech, something from New Harmony, a million years ago, and scrambles to scoop them back up and shove them into a drawer.

“Why don’t they just send it to your ‘padd?” Jorge asks. Jun scowls and slaps at a wayward sheet.

“My Spartans  _do_ ,” he growls. “It’s the damned bureaucrats that don’t listen.”

Jorge nods and waits. Jun leans forward and folds his hands on the desk. “What can I help you with?” he asks, and it’s suddenly measured. So controlled. Polite.

Like he’s a stranger.

“Don’t do that,” Jorge says without thinking.

They used to talk about everything.

Jun blinks at him, once, and leans back and scrubs at his eyes. “I’m sorry,” he groans. “I’m sorry. It’s automatic.”

“It’s all right.”

Jun’s eyes are broken, bloodshot. He drums his fingers on his desk, restless.  Restless. "Carter came by the other day.”

“I heard.”

“He wants to know if I’m coming back. To Noble.”

Jorge nods. Doesn’t ask. Can’t ask. Jun hears it anyway.

They used to talk about everything.

“Jorge, I don’t know.” Jun drops his head to his hands and drags his fingernails down his scalp. His hair’s longer, a shock of bright white blond he usually shaves away. Must be too tired. He looks so damn tired. His voice cracks. “I don’t  _know_. I – they need me here.”

“Is it up to you?”

“Of course it’s up to me,” Jun shoots back. “It’s Musa.”

Of course. Of course. Not ONI. “Kurt told me he pulled you after Reach,” Jorge says carefully. Jun scoffs, nods. Clenches a fist. Trembles.

“Yeah,” he says. “He saved my life.”

Jorge’s heart twists. How bad? Bad enough. With Jun, restless has never been good. “You feel like you owe him.”

“He saved my life,” Jun repeats emptily. “Of course I owe him.”

“He’d never hold it against you.”

“You’re not really helping, Jorge.”

“I know. I’m sorry.”

Jun shakes his head, rueful. “It’s all right,” he says. “I don’t even know how in the hell you  _could_.”

They used to talk about everything.

“I can listen,” Jorge offers quietly. Jun meets his eyes. There’s a riptide of relief, flooding and washing over the anxiety and the anguish and the exhaustion like a wave and for once the tension in Jorge’s chest eases. “Jun, I’m  _here_. Talk to me.”

“I missed you,” Jun offers hoarsely. His hands are shaking, shaking, and Jorge pries them gently apart and clasps his own grip over them. Solid. Steady. Jun hangs on like his life depends on it.

“I’m here, brother,” Jorge repeats softly. Jun nods, squeezes his eyes shut and fights. Jorge tightens his hold. Solid. Steady. “I’m  _here_. Talk to me.”

For the first time in a very long time, the silence breaks. For the first time since he got back, Jorge can breathe.

—-


End file.
